What The Research Says
- Rural areas tend to be poorer than cities or suburbs.
- Cities have higher (relative) crime rates than suburban or rural areas.
- City dwellers tend to live longer, and suffer from fewer diseases associated with sedentary lifestlyes. Suburbanites seem to live the longest, though the direction of this correlation is unclear.
- Suburbanites and City Dwellers have higher average incomes than their Rural Counterparts.
- There is a Happiness Gradient that says that rural living increases your subjective life satisfaction, while some research supports this the link is tenuous.
- There tends to be higher rates of mental illness and associated conditions in cities.
References
- Mental Life and the Metropolis in Suburban America: The Psychological Correlates of Metropolitan Place Characteristics (University of Chicago)
- City or Country: Who is Healthier? (WSJ)
- The Great Urban-Rural Happiness Debate (The Atlantic Cities)
- Rural Poverty and Rural-Urban Income Gaps: A Troubling Snapshot of the “Prosperous” 1990s (RUPRI)
- City Crime, Country Crime (University of California Berkeley)
- The Economy Where You Life (NPR)
- Human Capital in Cities and Suburbs (CESIS)
- Stress and the City: How Your Brain Responds (CNN Health)
- Suburbs Not Most Popular, But Suburbanites Most Content (PEW Research)
The Choices
Cities – You’ve decided that bright lights, improved job opportunities and the beauty and splendor of cities is worth the small but very real possibility of waking up sans a Kidney.
Score: +1 Wealth, +1 Risk, +1 Health
Suburb – You really felt connected to the Brady Bunch growing up, and mostly ignored the Stepford Wives.
Score: +1 Wealth, -1 Risk, +1 Health, +1 Happiness
Rural – Fresh air and blue skies are your cup of tea, the fact that that tea just happens to be 30 minutes away from your nearest neighbor is no problem, really…
Score: -1 Wealth, +1 Happiness